Well built for price
Useful zoom range
Full-time manual focus

None for its price

I chose this lens for my wife's Rebel 2000. She mainly photographs her completed interior design projects in client's homes. The zoom range is almost perfect for this task (she sometimes wishes for a little more focal length - no jokes please!). A larger aperture would be nice for some situations, but the 380EX flash takes care of just about everything (the flash covers the same 28-105 range which makes interior lighting control a snap). The USM focusing is fast, but sometimes it takes more than one half-press of the shutter button to keep the lens for searching for the correct focus. Not sure if this is the fault of the lens or the camera. Overall, the lens does a fine job. We have been impressed with the final quality of our photos, both indoors and out. I definitely recommend passing up the "kit" lenses and purchasing at least this lens. In comparison, there is definitely a difference in the quality of this lens, as well as the images it produces.

Customer Service

No experience

Similar Products Used:

"Kit" lenses from Canon

Fast, Quiet, Internal Focus, well built for price.

None for price.

This lens is great. I am no professional but compared to the 28-80 and for the price you can't go wrong. For this price the 28-105mm feels very well built, it is extreamly quiet and very fast. Images look great.

I bought a Canon Elan 7 kit from B&H with a Canon 28-80mm lens, boy was I disappointed with the 28-80.

I really suggest NOT buying any of the kit lens (28-80mm, 28-90mm).

Similar Products Used:

Canon 28-80mm

Cheap, light, USM, balances well on the lighter EOS bodies.

Moderate distortion, moderate light fall off.

I bought this as a snapshot lens to replace my EF 28-80/2.8-4L. It furfills my expectations. Not great, not that sharp, a fair bit of distortion at the long end, moderate light fall off. Build quality isn't impressive, the forward barrel wiggles around a fair bit at 105mm. Still this is not likely to be used as a PJ's bread and butter lens.

It does what I want fromit. Stopped down till the fall off is gone, the sharpness over the bulk of the frame is okay. Keeping away from the extremes of zoom range (especially the long end) keeps the distortion at bay.

Both distorion and light fall off are much better controlled than with the 28-80L I had.

Obviously it doesn't offer the image quality of the primes, but makes a very good snapshot lens.

Customer Service

Never tried

Similar Products Used:

EF 28-80/2.8-4L, FD 35-105/3.5, EF85/1.8, EF28/1.8, FD28/2.8, FD50/1.4, Leica M 50/2, FD 100/2

Fast focusing
good range
solid feel
internal focusing

can't get decent photos at wide end or using maximum apreture
zooming ring hard to turn from wide to tele

For Beginners:
This is a standard lens sold as packages in Japan, so not a bad standard lens to start off with. But the quality is not too good in the wide end as most people had already stated before, not as sharp with aperture wide open. I usually get 3 stops down to get decent photos, then it gets a bit tricky for indoors as most flashes will not have the power for f11-16 on 100 film.

For people who are serious about their photos:
Hard to think why people praise this lens so much as the quality is only OK, my standard Minolta 35-70mm gets better sharpness and less distortion. No doubt the USM works very well and near silent, but you better save more money and get the 28-70mm 2.8 from Tokina or Sigma.

Similar Products Used:

minolta 35-70
minolta 28-105

Good size,good range.

Construction could be better.

Not as sharp as my working 28/70 2.8L but a better range , size and weight for general purpose pics.And 1/4 the price!

Customer Service

Excellent NZ M.D.

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Just about every Canon zoom.

Optically good and very sharp(but with some distortion)Sharpness is fairly consistant across the frame. Useful zoom range makes it an excellent standard lens. Compact lightweight design. Good value.

Some pincusion distortion at wide end. Significant barrel distortion from 50-105. Some vignetting occurs from f3.5-f8 at all focal lengths. Flare can be a problem. Dust gets into the lens interior very easily. Zoom and manual focus action is sticky.

Although this lens has several weaknesses I can still highly recommend it.
I have owned the lens for seven years, using it on an EOS 5 (A2). It is used professionally every day and continues to deliver very good results. Images taken with it are regularly used as double page spreads in magazines. It has taken a lot of abuse over the years but has never failed me yet. Once you know its limitations you should have no problems. The fact that this is not a professional lens is reflected in the price. I personnally feel more comfortable taking this lens into severe conditions (sand, salt spray etc) than I would a lens costing four or five times as much. It was my intention to run this lens into the ground fairly quickly and then replace it with another the same - but the original is still working fine after recording something in the region of 75-100,000 frames. Many of my most sucessful stock images have been taken with it over the years.

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None

Good overll shrpness for class
USM with FTM (Full Time Manual) focusing
Filter does not rotate whilel focusing or zooming
No macro switch
Made in Japan

Macro only goes to 1:5
There's a little bit of play in manual focusing.

This compact, convenient lens is a joy to use. The macro function goes to 1:5 without a macro switch, and when coupled with a 250D close up lens gets to nearly 1:2 at a workble distance of 4-5" or so (contrast to Nikon 28-105 zoom macro which goes to 1:2, but at a focusing distance of about 1".) The lens barrel extends only slightly while zooming, and filter does not rotate whil zooming or focusing. The rounded blades give pleasant renderngs of out of focus objects. Th AF/MF switch plus USM with FTM allow fast, flexible, precise focusing control. AF is fast and quiet. For its class:

Customer Service

Not used

Similar Products Used:

Nikon N80 with 28-105 f3.5-4.5 zoom.

Useful focal range; Focus speed; Near quiet operation; Excellent travel lens because of its modest size and weight; Nice combo with my Elan7E/EOS30.

Average construction, resulting in i.e. a slight wobble in the barrel and a little bit of play in the manual focus ring. Contrast at the longer end could be better, but then again this isn’t an 'L'-lens or a prime, so I shouldn't complain too much...

For the record: I've got the Mark II version of this lens. Despite its mediocre construction and decent optics at best, I still would like to recommend this lens, because in my opinion it's excellent value for money. I have not regretted investing in this lens one moment and when I took it recently on a trip through southern Africa it turned out to be a worthy travel companion. As long as you don't enlarge your pictures too much and are satisfied with nice quality (holiday) snapshots, this lens should be seriously considered instead of cheaper zooms that Canon usually sells with their kit. Apart from that I also think this lens is a nice 'beginner/starter' combo together with the EOS30/Elan7E body. Having said that, I would not mind if Canon would release an 'L'-zoom with this range/aperture for about the price of the Ef70-200 4.0L...

Customer Service

EXCELLENT! I've called Canon here in Holland on several occasions and the people there have always been very helpful and more than patient.

Similar Products Used:

Ef75-300 usm III + my good ol' 50mm prime!

- Sharpness
- Focal Range
- Quality

- Few distortion, but just a few

Excellent lens! What a difference from the 28-80. Very sharp, very good optics. I recommend everyone buying an EOS300/Rebel2000 that buy only the body and then boldly complete it with this lens. My first roll of film with this lens were a breeze

Customer Service

Not tried yet.

Similar Products Used:

- Canon 28-80 3.5-5.6
- Canon 50mm 1.8
- Canon 100-300 4.5-5.6

-Internal focusing
-Weight
-Non-rotating front

-Collects dust easily which makes zoom ring operate heavy

This is my third one!
No 1: second hand, I didn't check closely enough and didn't notice the zoom ring running very heavy. Exchanged it for another one;
no 2: Aperture sometimes got stuck!
no 3: Just got it, finally one that seems to work as it should!

Overall I think it's a much better lens than the 28-80 f4-5,6 I got with my camera when it comes to sharpness, contrast and focusing. When it comes to construction, I think the standard 28-80 is just as good as this one (except for the rotating front element).

A big pro to me is that the 28-105 uses internal focusing which makes it possible to use "fun" filters.

Feels solid enough to me, haven't used it that much yet.

Customer Service

Great, asked for manual for camera (eos 500n) thorugh internet got it the next week

Similar Products Used:

sigma 28-200 (...), canon 28-80 f4-5.6 II (standard on eos 300 kit)